Elected Officers

PRESIDENT / JOAN WEBER:

During my final few days as WLA President I reread the annual reports of my first two years as President, read the draft of the following finalized annual report with tremendous pride. (To reassure anyone who was not a member three years ago, I assumed the Presidency half way through my elected term as Vice-President/President Elect normally the term of President is only two years.) I felt pride not only in my own achievements as your President, but pride in every member who contributed to the overall advancement of the association during my three years. In my mind, the major responsibility of the WLA President is to commandeer dedicated members, jointly develop a game plan, provide support and encouragement, then get out of the way and let the designers of the game play it! This annual report bears witness to the success of our plan:

1. WLA is fiscally solid.
2. Officers and committee chairs worked arduously to insure that every expectation was not merely met, but exceeded.
3. Interest Groups sponsored outstanding conference programs and/or workshops, drafted new bylaws, generated interesting newsletters and created or redesigned existing homepages.

The following report reflects the past year's achievements and "Upfront" in the March, 1999 issue of ALKI, summarizes all three years of my Presidency. Once again, I thank everyone who contributed to our game plan, insured its success through individual and collective dedication and commitment, and enabled me to leave with such intense pride in every one of you and everything we accomplished during my three years.

VICE-PRESIDENT / PRESIDENT ELECT / CINDY CUNNINGHAM

The WLA Vice President has oversight over the Legislative Day committee as well as participates in the Public Relations Committee. This year saw several new initiatives. On the Legislative side, Tom Moak and Lynne Zieher did a great job of coming up with an innovative program. We decided to change a few things about the day--instead of inviting elected officials and their staff to lunch, we made the entire morning a briefing session for WLA members. We had Steve Duncan, the Legislative Liaison and Nancy Zussy, the State Librarian, speak, as well as had a discussion on filtering by Tom Mayer, of Sno-Isle Regional, and Sharon Hammer, from FortVancouver Regional. A buffet lunch followed, and then WLA members headed off to the hill to meet with their legislators. It was a fairly quiet year for libraries--no harmful to minors or property tax issues were seriously considered. We concentrated our efforts on supporting funding for the state library and for the Washington Talking Book and Braille Library. Both measures at this writing were being supported. It also appeared the Friends tax issues were going to finally get addressed in a favorable way. The PR committee grappled with a Sustaining Membership brochure, to give to a new class of WLA members we created. In an effort to involve our corporate members more and give them some valuable membership benefits we agreed at last year's retreat to create a class of sustaining members. In turn for paying membership fees based on size of the company, they receive placement on the WLA homepage in a sustaining membership directory, discount on Alki advertising, and the ability to claim their special affiliation with WLA on their promotional material. The final brochure should be completed by the annual conference.

SECRETARY / CAROL GILL SCHUYLER

As Secretary of WLA, I have attended all of the Board Meetings, the Annual Business Meeting, and the Spring Planning Retreat. My primary responsibility at each of these meetings has been to take minutes, transcribe them, and then present them to the Board for approval. Both the draft minutes and the approved minutes of the meetings have appeared on the WLA Homepage so that the membership has earlier and easier access to the information from Board Meetings in an effort to further enhance communication. I have also summarized the discussions in the Board Meetings for each issue of "Link". Archival duties included going through, literally, dozens of boxes of WLA history. Gail Willis, Kristy Coomes, and I have waded through boxes of reports, minutes, publications, program handouts, financial statements, etc. and discarded everything that was a duplicate or no longer essential for the Association. What we are keeping is now organized and retrievable. The project is nearly complete.

TREASURER / PATTY DUITMAN

The treasurer's report for fiscal year 1997-1998 is appended to this report.

COORDINATOR OF COMMUNICATIONS / MARY M CARR

The Coordinator of Communications has the responsibility to oversee all print and electronic publications and assure that any materials representing the association present a consistent and professional image. The position oversees the WLA Publications Council, the ALKI Editor, the ALKI Editorial Committee, the LINK Editor, the Public Relations/Membership Committee, the Webmaster and the Homepage Advisory Committee. Reports from these individuals or groups appear under the reports of those reporting to the board and the committee reports.

COORDINATOR OF CONTINUING EDUCATION / DIANE COWLES

The Continuing Education Council has had a busy year, striving to meet goals written as part of WLA's 1998-99 Strategic Plan. One accomplishment has been the creation of a Continuing Education and Professional Resources Page with links on WLA's Webpage, with the excellent help of webmaster, Martha Parsons. Another has been a Continuing Education Needs Assessment Survey form that will be initially distributed at Annual Conference and later sent to the entire membership with membership renewal forms. Also, in an effort to provide continuing education offerings that had widespread interest, the Continuing Education Council sponsored, "Lawyers for Libraries: A Summary by Stephanie Delaney," on both sides of the state in March 1999. It was a seminar that addressed intellectual freedom issues and the Internet.

We granted Continuing Education seed funds to the following programs:

1. WLA/Western Area Interlibrary Loan Interest Group Fall Meeting, September 18, 1998.
2. "All About Collections: the ABC's of Building Solid Children's Collections," sponsored by CAYAS, November 13, 1998.
3. "Multicultural Storytimes," sponsored by CAYAS, March 12, 1999.
4. "Lawyers for Libraries: A Summary," sponsored by the CE Council, March 5 & 19, 1999.
5. WLA/Western Area Interlibrary Loan Interest Group Spring Meeting, May 28, 1999.

COORDINATOR FOR STRATEGIC PLANNING / JILL JEAN

The strategic plan for the Washington Library Association was developed during the Board Planning Retreat held in June, 1998. As in past years, the Board preferred to carry over, update or add to the current plan, as opposed to completing an entire revision of the document.

In developing this Strategic Plan, the WLA Board established five major themes to be focused on during the 1998-99 year. These are library services, continuing education, library advocacy, membership and association management. Within these themes, the Board established a number of major tasks to be accomplished as the Board moves through this work plan. Some of the areas of work have included needs assessment surveys for continuing education and interest group activities, ALKI advertising rates, a registration rate differential between member and non-member conference and workshop fees and a $3000 cap on scholarship tuition awards.

Since September, I have observed steady progress towards achieving the actions set forward in this strategic plan. In most cases, we have completed the action steps according to established dates and have remained alert to our commitments to monitor activities designated as "on-going." It is gratifying to note how dedicated this Board and its committees are in meeting work plan deadlines.

COORDINATOR CONFERENCE 1999 / TOM MOAK

This was a busy and exciting year for the 1999 Conference Committee, working towards the conference in the Tri-Cities April 28-30. We worked to build upon the successful 1998 Conference in Wenatchee. Utilizing the conference theme "Fond Farewells, Bold Beginnings", we, along with our Interest Groups, looked to find a number of good programs. We secured noted Washington author and screenwriter, Sherman Alexie, to be our featured banquet speaker.

We decided to have two keynote speeches, one on Thursday and one on Friday. We chose the new Executive Director of ALA, Bill Gordon, for Thursday and the new Director of the UW School of Library and Information Science, Michael Eisenberg, for Friday. When Bill Gordon had to cancel, we had dropped in our lap the merger of OCLC and WLN, a fond farewell and bold beginning we could not pass up. Don Muccino, the Chief Operating Officer of OCLC, and Paul McCarthy, the Executive Director of WLN, were chosen to present the opening keynote.

We chose 60-minute program blocks and filled them with from four to six concurrent programs. RIG planned one preconference on Internet genealogy and WALE one on Intellectual Freedom. Because the Doubletree Hotel was not large enough to do all of the programs we wanted to and still have room for an exhibit hall, we cancelled the exhibit hall for this year. Instead, we planned vendor interaction at a preconference function, Microbrew and the Vendors, and at the Thursday lunch.

We look forward to a great 1999 Conference.

COORDINATOR CONFERENCE 2000 / SUSAN ODENCRANTZ

Conference 2000 will be held in Tacoma from May 17th to May 19th. The theme is R/Evoluntion, and the intention is to take on the visions of the library in the first decade of the 21st Century. Not only are we looking to grapple with the present and coming practical aspects of our profession, but we are hoping to introduce some of the more fantastical ideas of the future. To that end, science fiction writers and futurists are being targeted as public speakers. We will introduce the Web site for WLA 2000 at Pasco and we are using a "hidden" web site to do the co-ordination of the conference.

Tacoma has changed since the event was last hosted here. We intend to highlight the delights of our town, and we hope that everyone who attends will have a wonderful time. We also hope that the weather will co-operate.

Other than beginning to prepare for the conference, I have enjoyed participating for the first time as a member of the Executive Board of WLA. The number and scope of issues to be debated and decided has been amazing.

ALA CHAPTER COUNCILOR / JAN WALSH

Highlights of the year included:

• Passage of President Symons' resolution on "Libraries: An American Value." WLA was one of the endorsing State associations of this statement, which will be featured prominently in an Intellectual Freedom Tool Kit being prepared by the ALA Intellectual Freedom Committee.
• Passage of E-rate resolution: The resolution encouraged all recipients to express appreciation to Congress and the agencies involved in the administration of the program, and urged ALA to continue to work to improve the E-rate program including the application process.
• Outsourcing Task Force: Three of its five recommendations passed, including one citing the essential values of libraries; one which encouraged ALA units to develop decision making guidelines for libraries under their jurisdiction in regards to outsourcing; and one that asked that the Intellectual Freedom Committee provide an interpretation of the Library Bill of Rights as it relates to outsourcing and privatization. A motion which asked for a commission to study the impact of outsourcing on services and management was referred to the Budget Analysis and Review Committee for cost implications related to the study, and the fifth motion, which flatly stated ALA opposed shifting the policy making of libraries from library management form the public to the private sector, was defeated.
• A Reinvented Annual Conference: ALA's Conference Committee put forth a number of proposals, two of which are to "focus most programming in thematic "tracks" and "schedule programs within a track in the same hotel (or nearby hotels)."
• Congress on Professional Education: The Congress will take place in Washington, DC on April 30 and May 1. Ken Haycock, director of the University of British Columbia School of Library, Archival, and Information Studies, chairs the steering committee overseeing the Congress. Check out the Congress on Professional Education web site for a copy of Ken's report and additional information including how to participate electronically.

PNLA REPRESENTATIVE / LINDA PIERCE

This last year was an exciting year for PNLA, a successful conference and a strong plan to reinvent the organization were important elements of this key year in the organization's history. During this year the Executive Board presented to the membership position papers on topics such as mission, communication, Young Readers Choice Award, regional focus activities which lead to the adoption of a strong Action Plan and Communication Plan which the will Board follow in the coming years. The 1998 conference was held in Sun Valley, Idaho and was a joint conference with the Idaho Library Association and was well received by all. The 1999 conference will be held in Calgary, Alberta August 11-13 and will have the theme "Common Ground". This is my last report as the WLA representative to PNLA. I have been proud to be a part of these exciting times at PNLA and would like to thank the WLA membership for their allowing me to serve in this position.

Other Voting Board Members

WLFTA REPRESENTATIVE / PATIENCE ROGGE

In April 1998, the Washington Friends and Trustees Association (WLFTA) held its annual membership meeting at the Washington Library Association conference in Wenatchee. Joyce Jones, trustee of the Spokane Public Library; Audrey Stupke, Friend of the Orcas island Library; and Bonnie Taylor and Shirley Painter, trustees of the Mid-Columbia Library district were elected to the steering committee. At the steering committee meeting following the general meeting, Patience Rogge, trustee of the Jefferson County Rural Library District was elected chair and Margaret Studer, trustee of the Anacortes Public Library, vice chair.

The steering committee met three times in 1998--in June at Yakima Valley Community College, September on Orcas Island, and November at Des Moines Library.

Achievements of 1998 included the publication of three issues of The Library Advocate, the WLFTA newsletter, the adoption of new by-laws, development of policies and procedures for WLFTA, and writing job descriptions for the steering committee. Although dues for all other categories of membership in WLA were increased, the steering committee persuaded the WLA Board that individual Friend's dues should continue to be relatively lower.

Innovations of 1998 included up-dates to steering committee members between meetings with e-mails on hot topics, meeting packets mailed to steering committee members prior to meetings, outreach to Friends groups by having members of the steering committee give talks at their meetings, joining Friends of the Library USA, and establishing a link to the American Library Trustees Association.

Jean Davies volunteered to act as secretary. Kathleen Ardrey was named to the Alki Editorial Committee, and Patience Rogge served on the WLA Public Relations/Membership Committee, which will soon publish a Public Library Trustee Fact Sheet.

Plans for 1999 include a Home Page on the WLA Web site, and the publication of the Washington Friends of the Library Handbook. The steering committee has met once in 1999--at Olympia on Library Day, and plans to meet in Pasco at the WLA conference, where we are sponsoring three programs and co-sponsoring two with the Public Relations/Membership Committee. WLFTA is participating in planning the 1999 Workshop in Library Leadership which will be presented by the Washington State Library in Yakima in September.

1999 brings the first-ever election of members of the steering committee by a mail ballot sent to all WLFTA members.

COORDINATOR OF INTEREST GROUPS / NANCY COLLINS-WARNER

By far the greatest energy of the Interest Groups this year went into planning and providing the wonderful and varied selection of programs at annual conference. A strong effort was made in this regard to insure that association members would be interested in coming to a more "remote" conference site. Much appreciation goes to the IG Chairs who took responsibility for insuring outstanding conference offerings.

Other activities that testify to vitality amongst the IG's included the establishment of web pages by CAYAS, ILL and WALE. Developing this format for communication with members holds much promise as a cost-saving and efficient approach. Please see the Continuing Education Report for workshops sponsored by Interest Groups. This was the first year of implementation of a new policy allowing workshop profits to be shared between WLA and the sponsoring IG. Newsletters were sent out by CAYAS, ILL, WALE and WLFTA to keep their members current on issues of interest.

WALE celebrated its 25th anniversary at an outstanding fall conference on Lake Chelan which netted profits for the association. WALE also established an award for "Outstanding Employee of the Year" being presented for the first time in 1999. WLFTA gave attention to its organizational structure while preparing the Washington Friends of the Library Handbook for publication this year. The WLA Board welcomed a new IG, Grassroots!, formed to promote librarians effective participation in the political process. This fledgling IG took an active part in WLA's annual Legislative Day in February.

Reporting to the Board

LEGISLATIVE COMMITTEE / BILL PTACEK CO-CHAIR WITH WLA PRESIDENT

The legislative committee began its work prior to the start of the 1999 session. The committee identified several issues that might require attention. As in past years, intellectual freedom, changes in tax laws, governance of libraries and information policy were the primary areas of interest. This year we also began tracking a great deal of legislation about telecommunications. While nothing major has occurred on any of those fronts, the library community did rally to support increased funding for the Washington Talking Book and Braille Library and for legislation that kept public libraries in the K-20 telecommunication network.

Legislative Day was once again well attended. Almost 200 participants came from all across the State. This year there was no lunch hosted for legislators. Based on the experience of the past few years it was decided to devote the time to providing information and background on key issues and then making effective contact with the legislators in their offices.

ALKI EDITOR / CAROLYNNE MYALL

The ALKI editor's report is incorporated in the ALKI Editorial Committee report in the section that follows.

WLA LINK EDITOR / LINDA RHINES

WLA Link is the newsletter of the Washington Library Association. It is published five times a year, after each Executive Board Meeting. WLA Link contains highlights of each WLA Executive Board meeting, announcements of workshops, news from interest groups, personnel and institutional news, a short calendar of forthcoming events and other new of interest to the membership. This year there have been 5 standard columns: Highlights, Editor's Box, Interest Group Chairs, Executive Board Members and Calendar. Articles may be submitted by WLA members or written by the Link Editor or Assistant Editor. The Editor for the fiscal year 1998-99 is Linda Rhines and the Assistant Editor/Editor Elect is Ginny Rabago. The term of office is contiguous with the fiscal year, beginning in July.

There has been a concerted effort to publish each issue of WLA Link in a timely fashion. Several factors have contributed to publishing Link more quickly. The secretary has been providing Highlights of the Executive Board meeting very soon after each board meeting. Communication with United Lithographers has been via the Internet, which greatly shortens the period of time for submission, revisions and final approval of the issue for printing. Martha Parsons, webmaster, has been very prompt in publishing the electronic version of WLA Link. It is generally available on WLA Online less than two weeks after each Executive Board meeting. It is often another two weeks before members receive the print version, which is printed by United Lithographers and mailing by Diamond Press, both in Spokane. The WLA budget now includes a stipend of $100 per issue for the WLA Link Editor. The Link Editor also sits on the Alki Board and coordinates with the Alki Editor and the WLA Online webmaster.

WLA ONLINE / MARTHA PARSONS

WLA Online has reached a fairly stable point in the last year, although updates are constant. Some of the major developments that have occurred are:

1. Two Interest Groups have added web pages -- CAYAS and ILL.
2. A list of Institutional Members has been added, with links to the member libraries web site.
3. A Continuing Education Resources page was developed.
4. The Organization Chart was "mapped" to current office holder information.
5. The WWWBoard Bulletin Board was abandoned and is in the process of being replaced with a member only discussion list.

In addition, with the very efficient assistance of the Secretary, Carol Gill Schuyler, the Board Meeting Minutes have continued to be posted within days of the meetings, the web Calendar is updated regularly, and during Legislative session, the Bills of Interest page is updated every week from information received from Steve Duncan's office.

The only measurement we have of usage is a hit counter for the home page. The current count, from August 25, 1997 to date (March 20, 1999) is 11422. The average hits per day have gone up from 16 to 20.

Committee Chair Reports

ALKI EDITORIAL COMMITTEE / LOUISE SAYLOR

A number of committee changes mark this past year. Carolynne Myall assumed the editorship, while Cameron Johnson, Kathleen Ardrey and Carla McLean were new appointees. The Committee thanked Vince Kueter, Esta Anderson and Mark Lammers for their years of contributions. Also, the WLA Board approved the appointment of the WLA scholarship recipient to the Committee, if each year's winner chooses to serve. The Committee membership is balanced geographically and professionally, with a community college, three higher education institutions, three public libraries, the WFLTA and students represented. This range of representation helps ensure wide coverage of appropriate and interesting topics.

The Board approved subscription and advertisement rate adjustments to more accurately reflect the cost of journal production and delivery.

ALKI is indexed in Library Literature and is available on the WLA website and on Wilson FullText.

AWARDS COMMITTEE / AMY RAVENHOLT

The Awards Committee sent out a call for nominations for awards to all voting members, reviewed the nominations, selected the winners and arranged for their attendance conference where the awards were announced.

ELECTIONS COMMITTEE / KAREN MICHAELSEN

The Elections Committee members (Karen Michaelsen, Chair, Elena Bianco, Elsa Steele, and ex officio member Gail Willis) meet at the Association Office to count ballots and report results to the membership whenever an election is scheduled. In the interval between the elections, the Association Coordinator (Gail Willis) keeps the Elections Chair posted about up-coming elections, asks the chair to call a meeting for ballot counts, consults about the format of the ballot or any other elections related issues.

In the past year we have changed the form of the ballot so that it is clear to voters how to fold the ballot. In the past, some have folded the ballot in half and the paper is too light to go though the U.S. Postal Service equipment. Many ballots were so badly damaged they could not be read or counted. The return address is now positioned in the middle of the page and the voter is instructed to tri-fold the ballot before sealing it with staples or tape. This has been much more successful.

The second change is that we are arranging the items on the ballot to make counting easier. Uncontested positions are put together, contested ones are segregated to make them easier to sort. This has also been a successful improvement.

The Elections Committee is thankful that Gail does so much to help us. We would be willing to do more. One suggestion would be that Gail not take the time to open and sort all of the ballots before we arrive. This takes time and the committee together might be able to do this more quickly. Perhaps she could just collect ballots in a box until we arrive and then we can plan extra time for this process.

FISCAL IMPACT COMMITTEE / KIM HIXSON

The Fiscal Impact Committee serves the board by reviewing board actions that may have implications to the budget process or the financial well-being of the association. This year the committee review the scholarship disbursement parameters in response to the board action which changed the criteria for awarding scholarships.

INTELLECTUAL FREEDOM / CHER RAVAGNI

The Intellectual Freedom Committee monitored issues surrounding intellectual freedom around the state, continued to work on the revision of the Intellectual Freedom Manual, and began the process of association-wide review of WLA's ""Statement on Intellectual Freedom" and the document "Intellectual Freedom in Libraries" with the goal of revising and/or reaffirming them by Conference 2000.

NOMINATIONS COMMITTEE / JAN AMES

Finding candidates who are interested and who are able to make the necessary time commitment to serve on the WLA board continues to be a challenge. The goal to ensure that the slate reflects a diverse make-up in gender, geography, type of library, and level of position further complicates the process. Because board membership now carries a great deal of responsibility, new members should have some experience with WLA before taking on board positions. WLA may need to consider some sort of mentoring process in order to develop candidates who are ready to serve on the board.

Finalizing the slate of candidates can be a fairly lengthy process. As a result, information about the open positions should appear in the fall issue of Link. Then notices about vacancies can be publicized during the fall through the Internet, including the wiif E-list, the WLA Web page, and the PNLA E-list. Once the deadline has passed, calls can be made to anyone who has indicated an interest. Depending on the number of responses, such individuals as current board members, former board members, library directors, library staff, friends, and trustees may need to be contacted in order to develop a pool of individuals who might be interested in serving. Compiling a fairly long list will make it easier to get the desired diversity. The slate needs to be finalized by January, with short statements about their candidacy written by each candidate and sent to the WLA Coordinator before the deadline.

ORGANIZATIONS STRUCTURE (INCLUDES: ARCHIVES, BYLAWS AND POSITION DESCRIPTIONS) / KRISTY COOMES

Work this year included working with the WLA Secretary and the Association Coordinator on the association's archives, working with the Coordinator of Interest Groups in assuring that interest group bylaws are current and in compliance with those of WLA, and writing the bylaws change necessitated by ALA's change in the Councilor term of office that will be voted by the membership at the 1999 Conference in Pasco.

PUBLIC RELATIONS / MEMBERSHIP / MARY CARR

This year the PR Committee has concentrated its efforts on internal communications and membership. Most of its efforts have gone to designing a sustaining membership brochure to entice corporate members (vendors, etc.) to join WLA at the newly established rates. The brochure will be finalized in April and sent out to potential sustaining members very shortly. Next year the PR Committee will devote a similar effort to improving the individual membership brochure and develop other strategies to attract new personal members to the association.

The PR Committee also assisted the Library Day Committee by helping to develop and standardize the Library Day materials, including the registration form and announcement. The Committee continued to add to the fact sheets bank available to the Association membership. Existing fact sheets were reviewed and revised. The Committee also reviewed the newly published Friends manual, and helped fund its publication

SCHOLARSHIP / TONY WILSON

In response to the WLA Board's actions in changing the criteria for awarding scholarships and the changes in the future disbursement of scholarship funds, the Scholarship Committee revised the materials used to announce the scholarship process. They reviewed and evaluated the applications for the graduate study scholarship and the conference attendance grants. They interviewed the finalists for the scholarship, and notified the candidates of their decisions. Plans were made to change the timeline for this process for 1999-2000. Those receiving the scholarship and the attendance grants will be announced and introduced at the 1999 Conference.

INTEREST GROUP ACTIVITIES ARE REPORTED IN THE COORDINATOR OF INTEREST GROUP'S REPORT AND THAT OF THE COORDINATOR OF CONTINUING EDUCATION.

INTEREST GROUP CHAIRS FOR 1998-1999:
ACCESS / Tom Joselyn
ARGH! / Lynne Kanne & Don Willis, Co-Chrs.
CAYAS / Nikki Maounis
CDIG / Susan Town & Jane Lowery, Co-Chrs.
DOCSER / Linda Fredericks
IFIG / Michael Wessells
ILL / Kay Vyhnanek
LAIG / Bette Anderson
LIT / Jean Pollock
PRF / Mary Kelly
RIG / Colleen Brazil
SRRT / Jonathan Betz-Zall
TSIG / Sherry Palmiter
USER ED / Ella M. Melik & Ann Reed, Co-Chrs.
WALE / Sherry Braga
WLFTA / Patience Rogge